Adds detail on negotiations
Delegates at the UN Cop 30 climate summit are discussing a text that would address the four items left off the summit's main agenda, Cop 30 president Andre Correa do Lago said.
The possibility was presented right after the first plenary on Monday, he told reporters today. The text could include themes key to Cop 30, such as adaptation and a just energy transition, as they are closely linked to the issues left to be discussed outside of the agenda.
"We are going to try our hardest to bring forward the results of Cop 30 as much as possible in two packages", he said. The first would deal with the items left off the agenda — unilateral trade measures, climate finance and countries' climate plans and emissions reporting. This would probably come by "the middle of the week", while the second will be left for Friday, he added. Negotiators were "impressively behind" the idea, he said. But the presidency stressed that the packages were just a suggestion.
The four items are often points of contention among the nearly 200 countries attending Cop 30. Parties will work overnight to try and progress decisions on ongoing work streams in the agenda, as well as the four topics under the informal presidency consultancy. The latter were discussed during a closed-door 'mutirao' — meaning collective mobilisation — meeting today. The presidency said that these four topics are strongly linked to the workstreams on the official agenda, and suggested that having separate talks could push parties to a decision on these long-standing, often controversial, issues.
Cop 30 chief executive Ana Toni made it clear that the text on the four 'off-agenda' items will not be a cover decision. "Usually, cover decisions encompass several topics," she said. "In this case, it would be a decision related to those four topics... only."
A first draft is expected on Tuesday 18 November, she said.
Delegations have reached the second week of the climate talks in Belem, Brazil. Discussions are moving from the technical stage to the political phase, as countries' ministers join the conference.
